An Unquenchable Heart of Worship

So... For ISOM we have to read a book every 4 weeks and I've read a few great books that really helped me out.

But I have to say, I think I found my favorite.

Its not a self-help book like the rest of them... its a book about the heart of worship, touching up on the different postures one has before the Lord.
I was more blessed by this book then any I've read in a long time, and I think its because Matt Redman GETS IT. A heart of worship isn't because you have an ear and a talent for music! Its a heart position. Its a thing of the heart.

He first talks about the unquenchable worshipper - it talks about how this worshipper is one who will not be extinguished. He could go through hell fire and brimstone and it wouldn't matter, because His praise would continually be on his lips.

Something that this part insinuated was that... you can almost see the beauty of God MORE through the hurts, the pains and the sorrows... because the more pain you go through, if you lean on the Lord, the greater His beauty is.

"Though overwhelmed by many troubles, they are even MORE overwhelmed by the beauty of God."

This is ... so admirable. So honorable. This sort of pushing through isn't something that says, "I'm okay, really. Nothings wrong!" but rather says with humility, "I am NOT okay. But I don't care. Just because I'm not okay doesn't mean that He doesn't deserve my praise. I will worship Him ANYWAY."
wow.
this attitude is such an offering unto Jesus.

my favorite quote here is by B.W. Anderson (and if you're a musician, you'll appreciate this even more):

"The laments are really expressions of praise - praise offerings in a minor key in the confidence that Yahweh is faithful."

A second posture is that of an undone worshipper. You'd think it was talking about how God so sweetly brings you to your knees, but its not really like that.

This also hits such a core with me (as do all of them, so I may just get it out of the way right now and tell you that each one of these postures are near and close to my heart.) The undone worshipper... is humiliated in the presence of a Holy God. They are put back into their place. They thought they were something and found that those somethings were really offensive to God - pride, little attitudes that brew up inside of our hearts that we don't see until its exposed by the light of His glory. And so, we may fight it or we may not, but an undone worshipper throws up his hands and cries out in ruins, "OKAY LORD! I QUIT! Here I am! I surrender!"
Its painful, but it hurts SO GOOD. To finally give in to the Lord? There's nothing so freeing then to just let it go!
You cannot be a true worshipper unless you are brought to the end of yourself and allow yourself to be humbled in the sights of a Holy King.

As Fancois Fenelon said so wisely (can't we just soak in this wisdom?): "

All our falls are useful if they strip us of a disastrous confidence in ourselves, while they do not take away a humble and saving trust in God."

This next posture just blows me out of the water: this is something the Lord is really working in my heart about, and if you let Him, He'll work in yours as well...

Undignified worship. I like to call it "Awkward Worship" because that's what it is: awkward. God's really been pushing me into an awkward state: invictus. having an uncomfortable spirit... being uncomfortable in worship - being so awkward that I CAN'T say that I did a polished job and that the only thing I CAN say is, "well... it wasn't for the people anyway... It was for God."

God has been bringing me to this point a LOT lately... its REALLY awkward. Did I say that?! Because I've never felt this awkward since 7th grade! But that's okay - "True worship always forgets itself" and true love never counts the cost.
I'm learning that in order for me to trust the Lord the way He wants me to, I need to stop counting the cost, and allow Him to shake me and change me and make me totally uncomfortable in such a way that the only thing for me to do that IS comfortable.. is to seek His face and worship Him with a whole heart.

The unpredictable worshipper is one that shakes the church... THE Church, and thank the Lord for the ALLOWANCE of unpredictable worship. This chapter was based off of the woman who washed Jesus' feet with her tears. It said,

"It was the act of a woman who had not been tamed by cynical religious attitudes...it was the worship of a woman who didn't know the rules - an unpredictable untamed heart on a quest to see Jesus glorified."

WOW.


Here's the truth that makes me want to WEEP because it says truth so beautifully - Religion must never be allowed to dampen romance.

This truly goes along with undignified worship... with awkward worship. It needs to not know the "rules" sometimes. It throws people off... but it brings them to a REALITY that God wants RAW and REAL, not polished and plastic.

We need to lose the politically correct term of saying "I'm a worship leader" and start saying the truth... "I lead Worshippers".


The Unveiled Worshipper is risking a LOT and yet, that's how it should be: Allowing God to open you up completely to Him... and making you completely vulnerable to Him and to the intimacy He wants with you.
to be unveiled is to be clean and completely trusting...
and what Matt starts to talk about is when you DO COME CLEAN, you realize the need to present yourself as holy and acceptable to Him as possible. We wouldn't wear ripped jeans and a T-shirt to meet the president, would we? How much MORE should be prepare ourselves to come before the King of the Universe?!
He is HOLY. Yes! I can bring myself just the way I am, but If I've TRULY encountered God, I COULDN'T go back to being the same!! I WOULD KNOW I've encountered Him because I WOULD try my best to TURN from the things that hurt Him and present myself to Him beautiful, holy. Pure!


The Unstoppable worshipper is a BOLD worshipper. I think this intimidates people because Christians take this and forget that being an unstoppable worshipper is NOISE unless it is coupled with humility and love. This is close to the unquenchable heart except that THIS posture is turned more outwards to be an example to others. This is the evangelistical heart - not being stopped by little hindrances but being adventurous and creative, stepping out to talk to people about what the Lord has done. Notice that this doesn't have to do with music. This has to do with being a WITNESS for Christ. Witnessing is worship. What is true worship when you praise the Lord on Sunday and then stay silent at work on Monday? The unstoppable worshipper praises and serves the Lord 24/7. They never stop! THAT is what we should strive for! This is what I need to be doing a better job of.


THIS one... this one is my heart in its truest sincerity:
to be an unnoticed worshipper.
Who cares about being up on stage? Who cares about who's watching and who's not...
to offer up worship... as quietly - as privately as possible is what my heart longs to do.

And to be honest, I've been doing a terrible job. Its hard when you're up on stage to not put on a show... Gosh... its REALLY hard. You HAVE to lead them... and you forget that YOU'RE there too... you know?
A true leader of worshippers needs to be devoted in the secret place... when no one else is there. The test for those won't be about the excellence of a played song, or the cleverness of written words, but the integrity.. the godliness of the person leading.

Once again I quote Francois Fenelon who said "make yourself little in the depths of your heart."

CHEW. chew. swallow.
bring it back, chew some more. Chew again. Let it sink in. WOW.

Its in the secret place that counts. How I am convicted.


I am. Right now, I am convicted. I have neglected the Lord. Why? He's given me no reason to! Why? Because I suck, that's why.


The second to last one is... the Undivided worshipper.

This talks about not being distracted. OR being a distraction. For me, this really convicts me about the opposite sex. Am I distracting THEM from the Lord? Are they distracting me? What about work? Am I so busy that I have no time to give God?
is it what I can escape to and pretend that like that's why I couldn't love the Lord like I should?

WOW guys. WE REALLY DO SUCK.

The day I struggle with thoughts about guys is the day I've taken my focus off of God.

its true. I KNOW God doesn't want me to focus on that right now. I KNOW He hasn't revealed a guy in my life. So I KNOW it isn't Him who is giving me thoughts to confuse my focus.

I need to have an undivided heart! It doesn't mean that the things that are distracting me are in themselves a bad thing, but the FACT that they ARE distracting me means that I need to set myself some guidelines and boundaries for my MIND and focus on the Lord. We need to worship Jesus louder then the noise of distractions sometimes... and WOW is that a hard thing to do. "To obey is better then sacrifice".

You can serve serve serve the people around you, but never actually take the time to seek His face.
He calls His disciples unto Him! You may THINK your sacrifice of service is enough, but you're disobeying the call of God. You're being disobedient. We need to remember... There are OTHER servants to do that job... for now, we need to just sit at the feet of Jesus, and take some time with Him.


the last posture of worship is that of an Unsatisfied worshipper. When you begin to understand the necessity of the presence of God and the joy that is found IN it, the world just doesn't cut it anymore. Its dull and shallow and dim in comparison.

The unsatisfied worshipper GETS IT. He gets that he'll never be satisfied until he gets to the thrown-room of God where true worship will be TRULY fulfilled!

With that world-view, NOTHING looks the same anymore! This place isn't our home! This food isn't even close to the feasting on the EVERY word of God we'll be entitled to in heaven! The riches here won't even COMPARE to the Glory of the common ROADS we walk upon in heaven the same way we walk upon concrete! We can't be satisfied any other way except when the presence of GOD is manifested more and more in something. That's the only way we'll even be able to be OKAY with something anymore!


I am so... convicted by this little book.

This is where my heart should be. Is it? CHH. No.
It needs to be though.

wow.


(wanna go back and count how many times I said that expression over and over again?)


I dunno. That's all I got for tonight folks.

My Concensus on the Purpose Driven Life - from one who once despised the idea of reading it.

The Purpose Driven Life

By Sarah G

10/1/07
revised 10/7/07

So I must say, I was proud about not reading “The Purpose Driven Life” all through out high school. What’s funny is that the first book I was handed in the beginning of this internship was the one I took pride in never reading! I’ve been humbled quite a bit however, and God truly prepared my heart for it.

First, on a humorous note, Rick Warren hit his peak when he said, “God made ants to be ants and you to be you.” You can’t touch that!!

The first third of The Purpose Driven Life mainly focused on beginner Christian content.
It was hard to get interested in the book until my attention was caught in Day 17, when it started talking about finding one’s place in the Body of Christ. That really stuck out o me and it began to help shape my understanding of what the Body should be to one another – REAL.

There was a whole section on forgiveness and how God expects it to be immediate, though He doesn’t expect or even encourage trust right away; and I can tell you right now, it was encouragement I needed to hear in my life. Warren talked about how to love people even after they’ve hurt you, and how to go about showing them the love of Jesus without becoming a doormat to more pain. Just the idea that I am at this exact place in my life where I needed to read this, shows God’s unbelievable faithfulness over and over again.

Reading on from this point, the book goes into how to approach and confront fellow believers in your church family, and that if you are to do anything, it must always be done in love. Situations I’ve been in where people thought they had a right to confront me about something that was NOT a sin in my life and correct it, has put me in a place where I absolutely believe in being in Love (God) before speaking into someone’s life, using the right of “Siblingship” as the means to do so. Whenever this happened to me, I would walk away feeling dejected and depressed. That’s not right, and in fact, it’s wrong. This whole part of the book put into words what I’ve been struggling with inside of me; and I always felt crazy, like I’m the only one dealing with this sort of thing. Am I the only one who tries to forgive with her whole heart, but struggles over that pain caused, over and over again? Am I the only person who finds herself forgiving that same offence as many times as it plays over and over again, through painful memory?
I’m NOT!! I’m a normal person! Jesus, Jesus was a normal person. I’m not crazy.

I LOVED how the book dug into REALITY and how the truth is, its hard to love people. It’s hard to be selfless, and yet we try anyway. Why? Because we’re attached to the believers forever. I love the analogy of the blood family – you hate them, you love them, you mistreat them, you bless them, but you gotta make it work because you’re related them, you’re stuck with them, and really, because you love them.

Another favorite part of mine started in Day 23 – Growing up, and how we grow. It talked about growing up spiritually and why it matters so much, and it does! I’m not even sure how to explain how blessed I was by this message. “The Purpose Driven Life” emphasized on always needing to grow up in the Lord by “working out our salvation with fear and trembling”. It went on to talk about how we need to change our mindset – what (or how) we think shapes our life.

Change became the focal point of the book at this revelation, and things really hit close to home when Warren talked about how we try to do things in our own will-power which only results in short-term results. This really began to speak to my heart as I began to realize that I depend a LOT on my own will-power by default! I’m finding that I’m terribly immature, spiritually, which in all truthfulness means selfishness and self-seeking. I don’t know what else to say except that the Holy Spirit convicted my heart in an awe-full way.

By Day 25, Warren began to touch the topic of letting truth transform you and ALSO letting troubles shape who you are. It seems that every topic this book targeted was EXACTLY the topic God wanted to speak to my heart about at the exact time I read it. The fact that I can’t get over this truth runs right into what the book was saying at this point about how God allows certain things to happen to us for specific reasons. This section turned out to be somewhat of a pep-talk. It talked about how to take hurts as they come and what to always keep in mind when you’re going through them: God’s got a bigger picture in mind. It really holds high the building of character through all the issues we face, and I’ve begun to ask myself if maybe I’m looking at things the wrong way in my own life.
What blessed me most was the overall message that said, “When you allow yourself to be refined by your trials, people will see Jesus’ reflection in you.”

From that point, the book flowed into how to deal with temptations: physical, mental, emotional – all spiritual. It reminds us that God takes His time with us, and how the people that God used in the past had major issues in their lives. But if we’re willing, He’ll go through those major issues in our lives WITH us, as He did with them, by allowing us to be challenged in our faith. Our biggest hurts and pains? His biggest source of ministry through us.

The next section was all on servanthood which just convicted my spirit of my self-seeking ways: even when I think I’m being servant-like, I’m really just doing it because I feel good about myself. What about the times I won’t and I don’t feel good? Will I still hold fast to being a bond-servant to Jesus Christ? I didn’t even know how deep this issue runs into everything I am!! But God allowed me to see this, through the words written in this book, and even in this rebuking of the soul, I am blessed.

The LAST part talked about the Great Commission and spreading the gospel. I’ll admit, I kind of skimmed over the last 2 days since they were just conclusive in their content.

All in all, “The Purpose Driven Life” was good because I needed to read it. It wasn’t the most amazing book, it wasn’t the most horrible either. But truth be told, it’s not about that. It’s about what God did in my heart as a result of going through it, and THAT result is eternal. I’m glad I read it.